Anticipated Results

by Dennis E. Bolen

“When?”

  “During the intervention. It became a talking point. The waste of it all. Squandering of potential. Non-use of the hand fate deals you. A physical metaphor for his lack of follow-through.”

  “Hmmm … Not sure metaphors are going to do the trick in this case.”

  “How about Jenna-Ka question mark? Would she knock some notice into him?”

  We laughed.

  “Maybe we can bribe Jeannie to bash him a few times.”

  •

  Later on, we had drunk most of the bottle.

  “What’re we going to do?”

  “You know how sensitive he is. We must be subtle. We don’t want to kill him.” I considered. “Who was it he had playing?”

  “What? Music?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh, all night it was Miles or Frank or one of the Winters.”

  “Which one, then?”

  “One of the Winters.”

  Anticipated Results

  One sluggish morning Rodney showed me a story about a terrible crime that had happened. By the redness of his eyes I could see that the nature of it threatened him down to the toenails.

  “See.” He tapped a knuckle at the newspaper on his desk. “It’s like I told you.”

  I looked. “Yeah, I saw it. Husband Helpless During Wife’s Brutal Assault.”

  “Can you believe it?”

  “No, I can’t. Just how the hell do you sweetly rape a person?”

  “What?”

  “It’s this ridiculous newspaperese emotional over-hype that never seems to heal up. No matter how many letters to the editor or late night TV comedy routines they do. The headline writers and”―I picked up the paper to look closer―“the reporters alike. They all use this dumb brutal-this and vicious-that to express what is already as nasty a deal as nobody should never have to endure.” I put the paper back down. “I mean, can you gently murder someone? And would it ever get reported that way?”

  “Well … That’s not my point.”

  “What is your point, Rod?”

  He railed, peevish. “Don’t be so impish, okay?”

  “Why so serious?” I sniggered. “Stuff like this happens all the time.”

  “Exactly!”

  He sat back looking at me. Moments went by. Rod’s eyes remained reddish. He said nothing more.

  I gave up waiting. “So?”

  “So. You think that’s the whole story?”

  I shook my head. “That’s enough of the story.”

  “Think.” Rod sat up straight. “There’s more to this. Imagine the situation.”

  I reached. Mentally. Reached down deep into my murky intuitions of him—the decades-old data-banks of his observed sensitivities—and tried to re-imagine the scenario of the newspaper story from Rod’s mind.

  He eyed me and the newspaper alternately.

  “Ahh …” I offered this as a way of getting Rod to talk again.

  “You get what I’m saying?”

  “No.” I had to be honest. “No, Rod. I’m afraid I don’t.”

  He aimed down at the paper with the finger-barrel of a pistolized fist. “Did you read it carefully?”

  “Sure, this morning when I first saw it. Some guys home-invade in the middle of the night to rob the place. May or may not be gang-related.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Grab the husband …”

  “And then?”

  “Abuse the wife. Maybe as a kind of afterthought. They didn’t intend to but as things played out it seemed like the appropriate thing to do.”

  “Exactly.”

  “So?”

  “Think about it. They could have done him too.”

  “Did they?”

  “It might not come right out and say so.”

  “It might?”

  “It doesn’t. Not in as many words.”

  “But you think they might have?”

  “They were holding him down.”

  “One guy.”

  “Yeah. One guy is holding him down.”

  “When you think of it, depending on the size of everybody concerned, no matter how slight a guy might be, that’d be a tricky thing, if another guy is raping the wife.”

  “That’s my point.”

  “What? That it’s tough to hold a guy down while somebody’s raping his wife?”

  “Well, they tied him up before they did it, didn’t they?”

  “I must have missed that.” I picked up the paper again. “But one would assume some such anyway.”

  “Whatever. That’s not my point.”

  “What is your point?”

  “That if they did that to her, then they could just as easily have done it to him too.”

  “I suppose so. If it all happened like it says it did in the newspaper.”

  “The newspapers report what the police tell them. The police tell what they want us to know. They’ve only just started their investigation, and they haven’t got anybody in custody. They only know what the victims told them, and if they know more … Maybe they don’t want to start a public panic.”

  “So …?” I put down the paper.

  “So.” Rod stood up. “It could have happened.”

  After lunch we were in Rod’s office. I was using a fingernail to unstick a scrap of corn chip from between two molars. Rod had gone out and got a different newspaper. “See. It says here they tied him down.”

  “Rod, would you let the stupid thing go?”

  “It’s not stupid.”

  “It is to obsess about it. Let it go.”

  “I’ll see.”

  “And besides … We have greater concerns at hand.”

  “What? The re-organization?”

  “What else?”

  “Not much we can do about it. I’d guess they’ve already figured out who goes where.”

  “Maybe things will improve around here.”

  Rod gave me his don’t-be-so-naïve-I-feel-like-kicking-you look. “The preliminary indications are not good. Like, what about this new floating manager position?”

  “Apply. I am. Everybody else is.”

  “I suppose.”

  “What have you got to lose?”

  “What have I got to win? The job description is way loosey-goosey.”

  “That can be a good thing. Define it yourself. Get into it and invent yourself a dream job.”

  “You make it sound so positive. Never mind that they’ll be taking one of us and making them a boss and then things will never be the same.”

  “Sheesh. You make it all sound so dark.”

  Rod pulled a pair of scissors from his desk drawer and began snipping at the newspaper.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Keeping a file.”

  “You’re pretty serious about this.”

  Rod looked up. “What’s more serious than having a couple of goons rape your wife in front of you?”

  His voice had a deadness I had not previously heard. I couldn’t tell whether it was because of the crime talk or the job talk. I watched his hands with the paper and scissors. In the instant he’d looked at me, he’d nicked his paper-holding hand.

  “Watch it.” I pointed.

  Rod looked down. “Damn.”

  He put the finger in his mouth. I stood up, intent to get to my office and the supply of dental floss that was there.

  •

  A couple of days later, Rod seemed even more grim than usual. We’d just had takeout Japanese food—both of us opted for the teriyaki chicken special—and sat sipping tepid green tea. I pulled out the toothpicks I had carefully made sure to bring along and offered him one. He looked at me quizzically.

  “Go ahead. You look like you’ve got something stuck in there.” I gestured to his head and hoped he’d appreciate a feeble attempt at joking.

  “Yeah.” Rod soberly took a toothpick. “I’ve been thinking.”

  “About tooth decay?”

  “Naw.” He didn’t laugh. “About that break-and-ent
er rape business …”

  “Hey, I thought we put that one past us. You have to live your life.”

  “I talked it over with her.”

  “Jeez. I don’t know if you should have done that.”

  “You’re right there.” He raised his eyebrows. “She got pretty upset.”

  “Women generally seem to keep cool as long as they think someone else around them is keeping cool. But if they see you’ve lost your nerve, they can freak. Especially if it’s their husband who’s not keeping their cool.”

  “I haven’t lost my nerve.” Rod leaned across the table. “I’ve come to a plan of action.”

  “Oh?”

  “Consider the situation. Two drug-crazed guys in balaclavas are raping your woman.”

  “I try not to think about that kind of stuff.”

  “Just imagine.” Rod spoke as if he had not heard me. Judging by his intensity I sensed he had not. “It’s happening whether you like it or not. What’s the only thing that’s going to help you out?”

  “Superman?”

  “Be serious.”

  “A telephone speed-dialed to 9-1-1 and sitting ignored in the corner recording the whole thing?”

  “You’re on your own. Nobody’s going to help you. At least not in time.”

  “It’s a pretty dire situation.”

  “It’s game over. Unless you’ve taken steps to prepare.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “What do you think?”

  I shrugged. “Martial arts?”

  “Or some such.” Rod unconsciously flexed the hand that was not encompassing his teacup.

  Then I woke up. I reconsidered Rod’s grave tone, watched his clenching hand, and understood. I fought the impulse to blink incredulously but smiled and leaned in close. “Let me get this straight …” I lowered my voice as much as possible without going to a whisper. “Some kind of weapon?”

  Rod smiled.

  “A gun?”

  Rod nodded.

  We were quiet then for too long a moment. I did not know whether to be confounded or congratulatory. All I could think about was how awkward he was with scissors. I cravenly reached for a quip: “You’re gonna get yourself a rod, Rod?”

  He smiled along with me. “Gonna get myself a gat, Nat.”

  “Gonna pack some heat, Pete?”

  “Buyin’ me some steel, Neil.”

  I sighed deep. “It’s good we can kid about this.”

  “Yeah, I guess. But it’s about as far away from a kidding situation as you want to get.”

  “You seem different to me now.”

  Rod brightened and threw his hands up. “The minute you make up your mind, you feel different.”

  I paused a minute. Tried to imagine myself holding a pistol. “Better?”

  “Much.” He laid both fists in front of him on the table.

  “But what about the statistics? The accidents. Wacko family members. Irate wives. The break-and-enter artists who find the thing and use it against you or somebody else.”

  “Statistics never made me feel as good as this baby does.”

  “You’ve already gone ahead and got it?”

  “I went shopping. Found what I want. Filled out the forms for an FAC …”

  “FAC?”

  “Firearms acquisition certificate.”

  “Oh.”

  “I paid the fees and signed up for the course. Now I wait.”

  “You went to a gun store and bought a gun.”

  “It’s an involved process. But yes. I bought a gun.”

  “No offence, my man, but …” I sat back. “You’re not so good with your hands, are you? I’ve watched. You’re the world’s worst driver. You took five years to learn to type. You can’t load a stapler. In fact, you’re a man who shouldn’t be left alone with sharp scissors.”

  Rod was still smiling. “Look.” He held out the finger. “Healed right up.”

  “You know what I’m talking about.”

  “I’ll be fine. I’m taking a course.”

  “Last week you tripped down a flight of stairs and you weren’t even drunk.”

  “That could have happened to anybody.”

  “You flunked shop in high school.”

  “I did not. I got a pass instead of a letter grade. That’s all.”

  “You’re the only guy I know who’s been found 100 percent at fault for a car accident.”

  “That was bogus. You were there.”

  “Yeah, I saw you open your door into traffic and get it sheared off. Now I’m worried about you getting something else sheared off.”

  Rod waved a hand. “There’s a different standard of safety when it comes to guns.”

  “I should hope so.”

  “And even though I’ve only handled it in the store … the feeling you get. It’s like drugs.”

  “Eerie you should mention the word drugs in the same conversation as the word gun.”

  “Oh, don’t get all ironic on me.”

  “Irony has a cute way of turning around and biting you in the ass—or should I say shooting you in the foot?—just like gun ownership. Or so I’ve been told.”

  “That’s not funny.”

  “It is so.”

  “It’s not that big a deal.”

  “It is between us. I always thought we’d be able to deal with life’s little exigencies with our heads, not bullets.”

  “We always hoped that.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Maybe this is using your head.”

  “I heavily doubt it.”

  “But you’re not absolutely sure.”

  “Of course not.”

  “Well, then.”

  “Well, then.” I broke off my admonitory stare. “I just don’t know.”

  Rod had not flinched. “Neither do I.” He pushed back from the table. “That’s why I got the damn thing.”

  •

  At quitting time, Rod went to his car and took off toward the suburbs. I’d been to his house many times. I pictured him pulling into the double-wide driveway and electronically opening one of the bays and parking his Lexus where it belonged, amid the seldom-used golf equipment and the ride-’em lawn mower that his wife could operate far better than he does. Rod’s wife had been a friend of our crowd for years before the relationship got joinable and for all the uncertainty they’d had before marriage things had settled down to what, for me, would be a near-stultifying degree of conventionality. I knew she would greet him with a smile and probably worry out loud about house maintenance or the heating bill or her job. They would drink wine and have dinner. They would watch TV and/or go for a walk around the neighbourhood in the dusk. They would set the house alarm, go to sleep in their sprawling bedroom and she would cuddle close to Rod, whatever the temperature in the room.

  Driving the short distance to my apartment I imagined all this as easily as watching a movie because I knew what Rod was about and was oddly glad he had something valued enough to be anxious over. The one slightly irksome aspect in our friendship was the fact that down all the years he had only been to my place once. We’d gone to a play and got dinner on a night when he would have been alone at home anyway because she was on some conference or other. We had a couple of scotches and yakked like frat boys. He verbally appreciated my minimalist furnishings and extra-big TV. We left his car at the office and I put him on the subway so he would not risk a DWI charge going home. That had all happened before Liza and I got together. He had not seen her cluttered and cute touches to my life. I did not know when he ever would.

  I cooked up some snapper and asparagus and went to bed reading The New Yorker. Liza and a pal had been downtown at a screening of the latest Dogme film. When she got home she slipped into bed and snuggled close, transfixed me with frozen feet.

  Nowhere in these two scenarios could I picture a firearm.

  Next day at the office I resisted the impulse to point my finger and fire an imaginary round through Rod’s doorway when I pa
ssed by. I opted just to stop and look in on him. He was alternately bending low over a notebook and scrolling through thick script on his computer screen.

  “What have you got there, gunslinger?”

  Rod swivelled around. “Management manual.”

  “Oh. That.”

  “Why aren’t you studying?”

  “I did. All that argotic gunk. It goes through one synapse and out another.”

  He wagged his head. “Interviews are next week.”

  “Yeah.”

  Rod turned back to his studying. “So.”

  “So …”

  •

  Walking back to my office with a cup of coffee I realized that a little more gun conversation was what I had actually been looking for. More edgy talk. Maybe something to make me feel like things weren’t so ominous. But there was an immense file on my computer screen titled Administrative Technologies that had to be read. It hulked in a corner of my mind like a comic book villain. I sat down and gave it my best, but my psyche kept interrupting with images of muzzle flashes, bucking foresights, sprung hammers, rifled chambers, expanding gases hurtling lead projectiles toward writhing targets.

  I struggled to shake my mind clear, kept running for coffee late into the evening, concentration hopelessly refracted.

  •

  Rod and I shared our next lunch right after the interviews. I was feeling crappy.

  “You haven’t touched your salmon.” He pointed his chopsticks.

  “I’m going to order some sake. Join me?”

  “At lunch?”

  “Why not?”

  “We never drink at lunch.”

  “I think I’m gonna start.”

  “I’d be asleep by two-thirty.”

  “Today, I don’t give a damn.”

  “Jeesh. They must have put you through a real grinder.”

  “Didn’t they do the same to you?”

  “It was tough, but I felt fine afterward.”

  “So you think you did well?”

  “I don’t know for sure. I guess. Didn’t you?”

  “Hell, I don’t know.” I flagged the waiter and ordered my drink.

  Rod paused his eating. “You studied, didn’t you?”

  “Loads. It was familiar enough stuff. Common sense, a lot of it. But you never know. I mean. Some of the questions were kind of twisted. I’m sure there were some trick ones in there. Like the one about organizational initiatives …”

  “Anticipated results …”